Significant

Thursday, July 28, 2016

Trump Now Blames Scientists for Global Warming ‘Hoax’

Donald Trump offered a new explanation this week on why he believes climate change is a hoax. Past explanations have included blaming China for making up climate change for their benefit. But that was before being nominated for President. So what’s his position today?Speaking with Bill O’Reilly on Fox News, Trump gave an updated account of why he thinks global warming is a hoax.

O’REILLY: Did you ever call climate change a hoax?TRUMP: Well, I might have because when I look at some of the things that are going on, in fact if you look at Europe where they had their big summit a couple of years ago, where people were sending out emails, scientists practically calling it a hoax and they were laughing at it. So, yeah, I probably did. I see what’s going on and you see what’s going on.

The Discredited ClimateGate Conspiracy TheoryTrump appears to be referring here to the illegal hacking of scientists’ emails in 2009, which climate skeptics gleefully dubbed “ClimateGate.” These conspiracy theories have been thoroughly debunked (see for example FactCheck.org, Union of Concerned Scientists, and Politifact). After the emails were released, every investigative report — from the National Science Foundation Inspector General, NOAA’s Inspector General, Penn State University, University of East Anglica, and the UK Parliament — reached the same conclusion: nothing in the emails in any way altered the overwhelming scientific evidence that the world is warming due to increased levels of pollution.Read more at Trump Now Blames Scientists for Global Warming ‘Hoax’